Fitting In
by justlook3
Summary: A late night conversation after the STEM fair about trying to fit in and finding that one person you fit with . . .


Jacob Stone made his way through the stacks of the Annex looking for a manuscript that he'd not been able to pull for his research hours before. After the STEM fair incident, the others had headed for home and he had as well. But he'd not been able to settle his restless mind, so he turned to what had always helped, his research. Besides, he really was overdue on that article. Which is why with the clock approaching midnight, he was alone with his thoughts and books. Or thought he was.

He turned a corner and saw Cassandra sitting on a bench deep in the stacks. Her knees were drawn up to her chin and she was staring out into space. He really hoped she wasn't having a spell, though she was far too quiet for that to happen. Or at least as far as his experiences with her spells went.

"Cassandra?" he called softly, not wanting to scare her.

Cassandra looked a little confused, blinking and looking around then her eyes settled on him. "Oh, Stone, hi. Didn't you go home?"

He shrugged and took a seat next to her on the bench. "I did but I couldn't sleep, my mind kept drifting back to the article I was working on before the clippings book went off. So I came back here. You?"

"Oh, I've just been up here. I didn't feel like going home."

"You know it's midnight right? You've been sitting up here for 5 hours."

"What?" Cassandra looked shocked and Stone understood why. It was very unlike Cassandra to lose track of time. "Seriously?"

"Yep," Stone looked concerned. "Are you okay?"

She bit her lip considering, "I'm okay. I guess I just got so lost in my thoughts. That's a new one to lose complete track of time."

"Most of us do," Stone said gently, "I do it all the time when I'm researching."

"Yes, but you don't have a clock in your head." Cassandra winced, that came out harsher than she had planned but Stone didn't look offended.

He nodded, "well, I suppose today was a lot of food for thought. All of our missions are . . . ." His voice trailed off thinking of a woman in a small town in New York and a trip he took to Paris afterward. He cleared his throat, "I've taken time to think them over myself from time to time. And that Morgan Le Fay, don't reckon we've seen the last of her."

"No," Cassandra looked down at her feet. "But that's not what I was thinking about."

"No?"

"I was thinking about high school and . . . well what little of high school I experienced. I dropped out, you know."

Stone didn't know that and looked a little shocked. He'd been slightly ashamed by his lack of anything but a high school diploma, though who knew what kind of education, if any, Jones had had. But surely brilliant Cassandra who'd talked today about scholarships and good colleges would have at least gotten that far.

"Really?"

Cassandra was quiet, "I was fifteen when they diagnosed me."

Stone nodded, the light dawning. "It got too bad to stay in school? It was worse than now?"

"Yeah, these days the meds keep a lot of symptoms under control and that little trick of yours helps quite a bit too."

Stone grinned but didn't say anything, encouraging her to continue.

"So it got so bad that I just dropped out, intending to continue my education at home. But my parents weren't interested . . . . Well their dream ended when my tumor happened. And they lacked the imagination to dream new dreams for me. I tried and well, here I am in the Library, living a completely different dream."

"I never would have dreamed this up either, not in a million years," Stone gestured to the stacks. "Yet here we are."

"And that's pretty cool."

There was a long pause after that as both of them sat in silence. Then Stone cleared his throat, "then were you regretting dropping out? I mean it sounds like you didn't really have much of a choice, health wise, aside from maybe going to a special school or something."

"Yes and no, mostly no. I was regretting what I did when I was in high school. I look at Amy Meyer and I see what I was and what I hope never happens to another kid."

"Her mama was very pushy," Stone agreed. "Though she seemed to be standing up for herself by the end. Were your parents like that?" He looked over at her and winced. "Of course they were. I'm sorry, Cassandra."

She shrugged, "as you've said parents . . ."

"Ain't ever easy."

"They pushed me so hard. Probably harder than a child should have been. But I was too young to know better and I was so smart . . . . At first, it was fun for me. Doing all that math, winning all those trophies. And when I got into my teens and started to notice that maybe I was missing out? Well, I kept telling myself that I would get my reward when I got into a good school. Then I could make up for it. But it all fell apart . . . ." Cassandra's voice trailed off into silence, Stone could read between the lines, she didn't need to spell it out for him. For her, no reward had come. All those years of sacrifice for absolutely nothing. Stone knew a whole lot about that.

From an outsider's viewpoint, for a boy like Jacob Stone, high school would have been a high point of his life. Handsome, popular, a football player, a wrestler . . . Stone was the very picture of the hometown hero. Expected to peek in high school and spend the rest of his life in a bar reliving the glory days like so many of his peers. But for the real Jacob Stone, high school had been as miserable and lonely as Cassandra's experience had been. And he'd had a shot, on a whim he'd applied for a bunch of colleges he knew deep down he'd never go to, using his grandmother's address in a nearby town. He'd been accepted to almost all of them and he'd even gotten a scholarship. But then his mama had gotten sick and his daddy had buried himself in a bottle and all of the dreams he'd let himself have just evaporated.

Cassandra's voice broke the stillness. "I looked at Amy and I wished that I had had the courage that she has. She's going to round out her life. I know it. With or without Dashell. Me, I let my parents dictate what I could do. And I never fit in. Not even with the other STEM fair set. I'm sure I had enemies, like Amy had, people who hated me for always winning. But I had no friends and I didn't even try to fit in."

Stone let out a snort. "Fittin' in is overrated."

Cassandra turned to him, the first time in the whole conversation that she'd actually studied him.  
"That's funny. Because I picture you as the hometown hero type, probably dated the prom queen."

"Homecoming queen, but that's not really the point."

"No? I can't see how it's not the point. It's obvious you fit in."

Stone laughed but it was bitter. "I fit in Cassie because I **made** myself fit in. Do you think someone with a passion for art and an iq of 190 would fit in at a small town high school in Oklahoma? Let alone be on the football team? Do you?"

Cassandra bowed her head, biting her lip. "I suppose not."

"Exactly. I made myself be Jake Stone, good ole boy. Just another dumb jock. I was miserable, every damn day. Every damn day. And when that torture was over, I let myself for five minutes dream about college and escape but . . . .well, I had family to take care of. And so I let everyone think I was just one of the boys on the rig. And died a little inside for 20 long miserable years."

"Until Flynn."

Stone nodded. "Until Flynn and Baird and Jenkins and the thief . . . and you. And this place. The thing is Cassandra, I never fit in anywhere. Anywhere but here. I just pretended to. So don't dwell on not fitting in with a bunch of people who never mattered. You fit here. Right here and right now. You fit."

Cassandra broke out into one of her beaming smiles, the kind that always filled Stone's insides with an emotion he couldn't quite explain. The feeling was a mix of pleasure and pain, but that wasn't unusual when it came to her. He'd never quite figured out why exactly she made him want to hold on to her forever at the same time that she made him want to run as far and as fast as he could away from her. Although if he stopped to think about it long enough, he'd know exactly why she made him feel that way and it was something that he just couldn't think about at this late hour. Still, he couldn't help smiling back at her.

"I think that's the nicest thing anyone has ever said to me."

"What that you fit?"

"Yes."

"Wow, people really need to start giving you more compliments. That and you should go home and rest."

Cassandra shrugged. "I'm not tired. But what I am is hungry. I didn't have dinner. There's a diner not far from here, are you hungry?"

Stone was going to decline, he wasn't one to eat after midnight. Though the protective side of him was not too keen on the idea of Cassandra going to a late night diner alone. He knew deep down that she was city girl and had probably gone by herself many times. But tonight she was distracted and a little fragile. And besides, he'd hardly eaten today himself. Then his stomach growled and his mind sent him an image of diner hash browns and he sighed. He knew when his stomach had won.

"Yes, actually, I suddenly have a hankering for hash browns."

"Oooh, yes! Those are the best. And a Denver omelet. And maybe some pancakes."

Cassandra hopped down from the bench and Stone followed her at a more leisurely pace.

"Where do you keep all that food?" He laughed.

"I don't eat like that all the time. But you know saving a bunch of high schoolers from a legendary sorceress does make me hungry."

Stone chuckled. "Sometimes I understand what Baird is going through when she mutters about things she'd never thought she'd say."

"I know right?"

* * *

It was three am and Stone and Cassandra were laughing in the cab of his truck parked behind her building. He'd been telling her a story about high school and she'd told a funny story earlier about a really failed science project.

It was really late and they should have gone home to their beds long ago. And neither was exactly sure what was going on here tonight, other than they'd had a really good time.

"We should probably say good night," Stone sighed, as his story ended and he looked at the time. "I'm sure the world will need saving tomorrow or today or whatever."

"Yeah," Cassandra echoed his sigh. "We probably should. Hey, I wanna thank you again."

"For the food?"

"Yes, but for what you said tonight. For listening to me. And for reminding me that the past doesn't really matter. I fit in here. In Portland, in the Annex and with you . . . and Flynn and Baird and Ezekiel and even Jenkins sometimes."

Stone noticed her slip but he didn't call her on it. Especially not when it was this late and that odd feeling in his gut that he got with her was tilting more to the pleasure side than the pain side. He reached out and brushed her cheek with his hand before pulling away.

"I made myself fit in lots of places, Cassie, but the one place I don't have to force myself has been here. In the Annex. With you."

And he let it hang there. He didn't rush to clarify that by you he meant all of the Librarians. He wasn't so sure he actually did mean you as a plural. Especially not with how blue her eyes looked in the reflected lights of the parking lot.

"I should . . .probably . . ."Cassandra put her hand on the door handle.

"Wait . . ."Stone's eyes got wide he hadn't planned on saying that. But he took a deep breath and took a plunge. "Would you . . .um . . . would you like to go to a movie or something this weekend?"

She smiled shyly. "Like a date?"

He nodded not trusting his voice.

Then she nodded too, "I'd like that."

"Good, uh, I'll . . .well, we'll figure it out. Let me walk you up."

Cassandra's apartment was on the ground floor, so it was a short walk to her door. They both stood there looking at each other awkwardly.

Then Cassandra took the plunge, she'd leaned over, her intention had been to kiss his cheek but he turned into her and then they were kissing. Maybe his intent when he turned had been a short sweet peck and maybe hers had been too. The kiss was sweet but it wasn't short. His hand came up to cradle her head as they backed into her door and deepened the kiss. Cassandra didn't really have a ton of experience kissing, this wasn't her first kiss but certainly it wasn't a commonplace thing either. But in this moment, she felt like she'd been kissing Stone for a lifetime and she could hear him moan in appreciation whenever she followed a hunch and did something she was sure he'd like. Finally the need for air was too great and they broke apart panting.

"How did . . .that bit when you . . .how did you know I liked that?" Stone panted, his mind right now delightfully blank of anything but the pleasure of kissing her.

"We fit, we just fit."

"I've gotta . . .darlin' if I don't go right now, I'm not going to stop and we'll be in your bed. And it's too soon."

She nodded. "I know. But . . . ."

He looked at her, shaking his head. "Cassandra . . . I don't wanna mess this up."

"No, that's not . . .no regrets?"

"Oh," he kissed her forehead. "None at all. We do probably need to talk. Especially 'bout slowing this way down. But it's time I faced something that you already seem to know."

"What's that?"

Stone didn't answer right away, just kissed her this time soft and sweet. He tilted her face so they were looking in each other's eyes. "We fit, we just fit."

She nodded. "Good night, Jacob."

"Good night, Cassandra."

And this time she went into her apartment. It can't be said that either of them got much sleep. But when they saw each other again, they made plans to follow Stone's advice about fitting in. No more looking back. The only thing that mattered was the place and the person they fit with.

The End


End file.
